TRS lures Congress leader after Cheruku’s jump

HYDERABAD: A day after Cheruku Srinivas Reddy had crossed over to Congress, the ruling TRS gave a taste of its own medicine to the party by weaning away its general secretary of erstwhile Medak district Cheruku Kondal Reddy into its fold.
Srinivas Reddy, who is entering the Dubbak poll fray on a Congress ticket, is invoking his late father Cheruku Mutyam Reddy’s name.In a Facebook post, he said the constituency got water and roads when his father was the MLA.
Meanwhile, TRS candidate Solipeta Sujatha, who hit the campaign trail, said she was hoping that the electorate would help her win with a margin of one lakh votes. TRS leaders are hand-holding her in the campaign. Medak legislator and former deputy speaker M Padma Devender Reddy, who accompanied Sujatha during a campaign meeting on Wednesday, sought to remind the people that it was the late Solipeta Ramalinga Reddy who worked to get drinking water to the constituency.
For BJP candidate M Raghunandan Rao, the challenge came from within. BJP’s Dubbak constituency leader Kamalakar Reddy questioned the decision of the party leadership to field Raghunandan Rao. He pointed out that the party had given Rao a chance three times to contest the polls and that he had lost on all occasions. “The party should rethink on his candidature,” he said.